Statements

Keep the pressure on to free Marissa Alexander!

In a victory won by popular mobilization, Marissa Alexander will receive a new trial. On Sept. 26, Judge James H. Daniels issued the decision for a retrial. The basis for the retrial is that the lower court erroneously put the burden on Marissa to prove self-defense beyond a reasonable doubt; the burden should have been to raise a reasonable doubt.

In reality, the retrial is being granted because of the popular outcry that thundered across the country and the world – in the streets and on the internet – declaring the Florida courts guilty of racist hypocrisy.

Marissa was convicted of aggravated assault and sentenced, under mandatory minimum sentencing laws, to 20 years in prison in the same state that let George Zimmerman walk free.

Marissa unloaded a warning shot into the ceiling to stop her abusive ex-partner in the midst of an assault just nine days after she had given birth. She had a permit and was trained to use the gun, and she hurt no one. As is widely known, Zimmerman shot and killed Trayvon Martin, an unarmed 17-year-old. The same prosecutor, Angela Corey, oversaw both cases. The same court sent an African American woman who dared to fight back against abuse to prison while freeing a racist murderer of an African American teenager.

The system had every intention of railroading and denying Marissa her rights. But they met with a powerful obstacle – the voice to the people. In cities and states across the country and internationally people created websites, started petitions, published statements and took to the streets in rallies, marches and speak-outs to demand Marissa’s freedom.

The racist court system was forced to make a concession in agreeing to a new trial. But Marissa is still in prison. There is a decision coming on whether she will be released on bail pending the trial. The judge’s decision only agreed that the jury instructions on self-defense were wrong.

This initial victory is not the end of the struggle to free Marissa Alexander. Under a just system, she would never have been imprisoned. She should be immediately released from prison and home with her children today. We must continue the pressure until that is the case.